Paradiso
Canto XII
A second band of spirits appear, and form a circle outside the first. One of these is St. Bonaventura. He, a Franciscan, sings the praises of St. Dominic, just as Aquinas, a Dominican, had celebrated St. Francis. After telling of Dominic’s birth in Spain, his unworldliness and his fervent preaching against the Albigenses, he goes on to condemn the degeneracy of his own, the Franciscan, order. He then names those famous theologians who are with him.
SOON as the blessed flame had with the last
Word spoken stayed the utterance of its tongue,
The sacred mill began to circle past;[i]3. “The sacred mill”: the ring of spirits.
Nor one full revolution had it swung
Before another enclosed it in a ring,
And motion chimed with motion, song with song;
Song that surpasseth all our Muses sing,
Our Sirens, in those dulcet pipes sustained,
As the sun’s beams the beams they backward fling.
Even as the frail film of the cloud is spanned [10]
By two bows parallel and like in hue,
When Juno to her handmaid gives command,[ii]12. “Her handmaid”: Iris, the rainbow.
Outer from inner being born anew,
Like that lost nymph repeating sound for sound[iii]14. “That lost nymph”: Echo, who wasted away to a voice.
Whom love consumed, as sun consumes the dew;
And presage then is with assurance crowned
By the pact God with Noah certified
That the world never shall again be drowned;
So did these ever-living roses glide
In circle, a double garland, joy-possessed; [20]
So the outermost to the innermost replied.
Soon as the dance and heavenly revel ceased
Both of the singing and the flaming, loopt
About us,—light caressing and caressed,—
All by one impulse at one moment stopt,
Like the eyelids that must needs in unison,
As pleasure prompts, be lifted or be dropt,
A voice that came out of the heart of one
Of the new lights turned me, as tractable
As needle to the star, to where it shone, [30][iv]30. “Needle”: of a compass.
And spoke: “The love I glow with bids me tell
Of the other Leader on account of whom
That voice hath celebrated mine so well.[v]33. St. Thomas, for love of his own leader, St. Dominic, has been praising St. Francis.33. St. Thomas, for love of his own leader, St. Dominic, has been praising St. Francis.
‘Tis fit that, where the one is, the other come,
That, as together to the uttermost
They strove, together may their glory bloom.
The army of Christ, which at so dear a cost[vi]37. “At so dear a cost”: by Christ’s atonement.
Was armed afresh, behind the standard strayed,
A lagging, scattered, and mistrustful host,
When the Emperor who reigns forever made [40]
Provision for His soldiers in their hour
(By grace alone, not that ’twas merited);
And, as hath been said, came to His bride’s succour
With two champions, by whose deed, whose word,
The folk regained the path and footing sure.
In that land where the sweet west wind is stirred[vii]46. “In that land . . .”: Spain.
To open the fresh foliage to the light,
And therewith Europe shows her re-attired,
Not far from where the waves of ocean smite
Behind which, when his weary course he quits, [50]
The sun at times hideth from all men’s sight,
The fortune-favoured Calaroga sits[viii]52-54. “Calaroga”: a town in Old Castile, whose shield has two lions.
With the great shield protecting her repose
Whereon the lion, who subdues, submits.
Therein was born the enthusiast amorous
Of Christian faith, the saintly wrestler, kind
Unto his own, severe unto his foes.
So charged, soon as created, was his mind
With quickening power, that in the womb it led
His mother a prophetic tongue to find. [60][ix]60-66. Before his birth, his mother had prophetic dreams; so had his godmother at his baptism which is conceived here as a wedding.
When at the sacred font were perfected
The espousals pledged between the faith and him,
Where, dowried each with mutual weal, they wed,
The lady assenting for him, in her dream
Beheld the marvel of the fruit’s reward
Wherewith he and his heirs should come to teem;
And, that his name should with himself accord,
They called him, prompted by a spirit from here,
By the possessive of his only Lord.[x]69. Dominicus means “of the Lord.”
Dominic was he named; and I aver [70]
He was a husbandman chosen by Christ
To tend His garden and be His helper there.
Messenger and familiar of Christ
He showed him; for his love’s first loyalties
Clung to the first great counsel given by Christ.[xi]75. The “counsels” of Christ are poverty, continence, and obedience.
Often, awake and silent on his knees, ~
His nurse would find him on the floor, as who
Should there be saying: ‘I am come for this,’
O father of him called truly Felix! O
Mother of him called also truly Joan [80][xii]80. Joan signifies in Hebrew “the grace of Lord.”
(If the word rightly they interpret so)!
Not for the world for which men now toil on
After him of Ostia and Thaddeus; nay,[xiii]83. “Him of Ostia” (Enrico da Susa) and “Thaddeus”: two famous professors.
But for the love of the true bread alone,
A mighty teacher soon, he went his way
About the vineyard to restore the vine
Which, tended ill, fast withers and goes grey.
And from the Seat which once was more benign[xiv]88. “The Seat”: the Papal chair.
To the honest poor (not that itself forswore,
But through him who degenerate sits therein); [90]
Not to dispense, for seven, three or four;[xv]91. To dole out in charity only part of the money on hand. gs. “What nursed . . .”: the Faith.
Not for the gift of the first vacancy;
Not for the tithes belonging to God’s poor
He asked, but licence and authority
Against error to combat for what nursed
Those twice twelve flowers that here engarland thee.
With doctrine and with will then, both endorsed
With the apostolic office, forth he went
Swift as a torrent from some high vein forced.
On stocks and stumps of heresy he spent [100]
His vehemence, most impetuously where
Most stubborn was the opposed impediment.
Springing from him then divers runnels fair
Water the Catholic orchard near and far,
So that its saplings breathe more living air.
If such as this was one wheel of the car
In which the Holy Church made her defence
And won on the open field her civil war,
Plain enough must appear the excellence
Of the other one about whom Thomas told, [110]
Before my coming, in so courteous sense.
But, where the topmost of the wheel once rolled,[xvi]112. “The wheel” is St. Francis. His track is deserted by the Franciscans.
The track deserted shows now not a hint;
So that, where once was crust, is now but mould.
His household, who marched on, treading the print
His feet made, has so turned itself about
That the toe strikes on the heel’s former dint;
And soon shall it appear what crop is got
From careless tillage, when the tares begin
Their plaint that from the barn they are shut out. [120]
I well know that who searches close and keen
Our volume, might yet find a page to cull
Where he might read ‘I am as I have been’;
But not Casál’s or Acquasparta’s school[xvii]124-125. “Casale” and “Acquasparta”: the homes of the leaders of two Franciscan factions. “Scripture”: the Rule of St. Francis.
Breeds such, for these our scripture’s meaning turn;
So that one shirks, and the other cramps, its rule.
I am the spirit of Bonaventura, born
In Bagnoregio; in great offices
The temporal care ever I had in scorn.
Illuminato, Austin, look! are these, [130][xviii]130. Two early followers of St. Francis.
Of the first brethren vowed barefoot to go,
Friended with God and with the cord made His.
Hugh of St. Victor is here with them also,[xix]133-134. “Hugh of St. Victor’: a famous theologian.—“Peter Mangiadore”: the author of a commentary on the Bible.—‘Peter of Spain,” a great logician, became Pope John XXI.
And Peter Mangiadore and Peter of Spain,
Who in his twelve books spreadeth light below;
Nathan the prophet; the metropolitan[xx]136-140. St. John “Chrysostom” was Metropolitan of Constantinople. St. Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, was a keen theologian.—‘Donat” was a grammarian.—‘Rabano”: a Biblical commentator.—“Joachim,” Abbot of Flora in Calabria, founded a new branch of the Cistercians.
Chrysostom; Anselm; Donat, who was guide
To the first art, nor held it in disdain.
Rabano is here; and, shining at my side,
Joachim the Calabrian abbot, great [140]
In gift, through whom the spirit prophesied.
So mighty a Paladin I celebrate,
Moved by the ardour and the courtesy
Of brother Thomas and his speech discreet;
And moved is all this company with me.”